I'm not a war-movie kind of guy, or a particularly right- or left-leaning political person, so Green Zone was a bit different than what I'd normally pay $7.25 to go see. But the film itself was well-done and thought-provoking, and not just because it hinged on a rogue Marine out to prove that there were no WMDs (weapons of mass destruction) to be found in Iraq.

Matt Damon and director/producer Paul Greengrass team up again after the success of Bourne Supremacy and Bourne Ultimatum. I can't say I'm a huge fan of the style, because it's bound to make you motion-sick after a while, and there's something to be said for the clarity with which the camera is able to pick things up. But the truth is, we feel like we're right there with Chief Warrant Officer Roy Miller (Damon) as he's beaten by his own "side," Special Forces, and by Iraqis, and certainly while he's chasing the truth in the person of General Al-Rawi (Yigal Naor).

Miller becomes convinced, after the hundredth site that his team has invaded and found empty, that there are no WMDs and that the government has been lied to or is lying in the information it is passing on to soldiers in the field. No amount of military protocol will keep him from trying to discover the truth, and he ends up aided by a civilian Iraqi, Freddie (Khalid Abdalla), who provides him with crucial information and translating skills. And one of the things that Freddie provides for us is an additional narrator, from the Iraqi side, of what the war means.

What the movie seems to focus in on is political deceit in the person of Greg Kinnear's Clark Poundstone, and the way that we picture Iraq as one entity, in complete agreement. I told a friend after seeing the film that I was reminded of Hotel Rwanda, where the good old white cavalry charges into a situation and assumes it's black and white (pun intended). Instead, the Iraqi people are divided: they are pro-Saddam, anti-Saddam, or undecided. There are different cultures and different belief systems, and they're as diverse as the American people, but they're depicted differently here than they are often portrayed in the media.

But the truth is that the deception and the self-deceit is the battleground of this movie. The army is following orders, the administration saying one thing and the truth being another. (The most ironic scene is a room full of military personnel applauding at George W. Bush's announcement that the war is over... even as they know it's not.) But let's set aside the military and political aspects for a moment. What happens when we let one group or one individual tell us the way that it really is, without checking or experiencing it for ourselves? What happens when we know what the truth is but we let someone else deceive us? Who is at fault then?

Unfortunately, this is not just a military or political problem. It's not an us-versus-them problem, either. It happens right here in the U.S. when we buy into the lies that someone else is selling: the lies of money, wealth, violence, sexism, racism, etc. I've seen this play out in churches, whether it's socio-political about who spends the money and how the church behaves from a structural perspective, or if it's the lone voice from the pulpit preaching its own "gospel" and no one else is checking the Scripture for confirmation of what's being taught.

The truth is that we're taught to love God with our whole heart, our strength, and our whole mind. Isn't it time that we started thinking for ourselves?